Snapshots

The Snapshots feature allows you to Create, Copy, Delete, Publish, Revert, Preview, and Unpublish the configuration of your Game, allowing for in-depth management of each stage of the release.

Game Snapshots, Screen Snapshots, and Experiments! Game Snapshots do not contain any of the Manage section configuration you've built up for your Admin Screens nor any of the Experiment configuration. You can create separate Screen Snapshots for the Manage or Experiment configuration and publish these to the Live environment independently of your game Snapshots. However, you must publish a game Snapshot to Live before you publish a Screen Snapshot to Live or publish an Experiment to Live. For details, see below.

IMPORTANT! If your game is Development Pricing Tier, you won't be able to publish a Snapshot to Live - you must first upgrade to Standard Pricing Tier to be able to do this. For details on how to upgrade your game's Pricing Tier, please see the Game Overview page. For details of what's included for the different Pricing Tiers, please see our Pricing webpage.

Snapshots - Creation and Basics

You can create a Snapshot of the current game configuration by clicking Create in the Snapshots section on the Game Overview page.

A Create Game Snapshot dialog appears where you can enter a description of the Snapshot.

Click Create to create the Snapshot:

You can then use icon button options (highlighted):

- Preview any of the Snapshots without having to revert to them. Editing will be disabled when previewing.

- Copy the Snapshot to create a new game or overwrite an existing game. You can only overwrite a game if you are a game owner or admin for the game. You'll have the option to copy:

Only the metadata from the original Snapshot.

Only the game configuration.

Both the metadata and the game configuration.

Downloadables

Collaborators

Important! Don't worry about overwriting the target game's configuration. There is a fail-safe - a Snapshot of the target game's previous version is automatically created (called "AUTOSAVE - Pre Copy") before the copy occurs.

- Publish the configuration to the Live servers. The snapshot that is currently published is highlighted in green. See below for more detail on publishing.

- Revert your workspace with the selected Snapshot version. There is another fail-safe - a Snapshot of the previous version is automatically taken (called "AUTOSAVE - Pre Revert").

Game Data Indexes and Snapshots

When you create a game Snapshot, any indexes for Data Types you've created using the Game Data Service will be made available for your game's Live stage when you publish the Snapshot:

None of the data you've inserted into Data Types in Preview will be published to Live.

Any changes to Game Data indexes will be made to the Live stage and a re-indexing will occur when you publish to Live.

For more details, see the Data Types in Preview and Live section on the Data Explorer page

Mongo Database Collections for Snapshots

When you take a Snapshot, the platform records all of your game's configuration into a configuration set:

This includes all Metadata Collections and their content.

This excludes all Runtime and System Collections and their content. These are created new for the Live stage when you first publish a game Snapshot and remain untouched when future Snapshots are published.

Secondly, Experiments are also published to the game's Live stage separately.

Note: Although Screen Snapshots and Experiment configurations are kept separate from your game configuration, you must publish a game Snapshot to Live before you publish a Screen Snapshot or Experiment to Live.

Copying a Snapshot

The Copy Snapshot dialog gives you options for customizing your copy.

Choosing the Target Game for your Copy

On the Copy Snapshot dialog, you can use the Game drop-down to choose to copy the Snapshot to a new game or to overwrite an existing game that you have access to and have permissions to edit. When the copy completes, a confirmation dialog appears and you can click to view the target game:

If you copied the Snapshot to a new game, you'll be taken to a new game that has been named by prefixing "COPY" to the source game's name. You can then edit the new game's name from the Game Overview page.

If you copied the Snapshot to an existing game, you'll be taken to that game.

Choosing What to Include in your Copy

When you select what to include when you copy a Snapshot, it's important to be clear about what is and what is not included in a Snapshot:

A Snapshot includes:

The game configuration.

Metadata collections.

Downloadables.

A Snapshot does not include:

Collaborators added to a game.

On the Copy Snapshot dialog, you can select what you want to include in the copy using four check boxes:

Include metadata collections - choose whether to include the metadata in the copy.

Include game configuration - choose whether to copy the game configuration onto an existing game, overwriting the existing game's configuration:

When copying to a new game, this option is disabled because in this case the Snapshot's game configuration is always copied.

Include downloadables - choose whether to copy the binary data content you have uploaded to the game.

Note that if you include the source game's collaborators in the copy, they become collaborators for the target game. However, if you then open the target game after copying a Snapshot and revert to a previous Snapshot, the copied collaborators will not be removed because they are not included in a Snapshot in the first place.

Deleting a Snapshot

When you select delete, a warning/confirmation dialog appears. Press Ok to confirm only if you are absolutely sure you want to delete the Snapshot.

Publishing a Snapshot

Publishing a Snapshot places the configuration of the game into the Live environment, where the game can then be accessed by your players. For in-depth tutorial on versioning read here.

Once you confirm your selection to publish the Snapshot, it will be highlighted in green within the list of Snapshots:

Note that when you have published a Snapshot, you can unpublish it - for details see below.

Going Live Checklist! Before you publish your Snapshot to Live, please review the Going Live Checklist to ensure everything runs smoothly.

Publishing a Snapshot for the First Time

When you publish one of your game's Snapshots from Preview to Live for the first time, a confirmation dialog appears. This acts as a reminder, which you can use to finally decide on the Primary Region for your game:

In this example, although we selected the Americas as the game's primary region when we created the game, we've changed the Primary Region to Asia, since we expect most of our players to be located in this region. If we hadn't changed the region for the published game, players in Asia would have been far more susceptible to possible latency issues when playing the game:

IMPORTANT! When you have selected the Primary Region on first publication of a Snapshot, you cannot change it on any subsequent Snapshot publication!

No Region Specified? If you've not selected for a specific Primary Region when you created your game and have left the region as the default: I don't know, you can leave this as the selection and publication will not be blocked. However, the region used for your game is unpredictable.

Reverting a Snapshot

You might want to revert to earlier version of your game configuration or saved metadata collections if you have accidentally removed some configuration details or if something recently went wrong. When Reverting to a Snapshot you'll be prompted for a confirmation.

Snapshot AUTOSAVE! When you revert a Snapshot, your current configuration is saved to create an automatic Snapshot of everything as it was before the revert:

Previewing a Snapshot

You can preview a Snapshot and inspect the game configuration of that Snapshot, which saves you having to fully revert to it then having to revert back to your original state. In Snapshot Preview mode, all game configuration editing is disabled and you'll see what's being previewed at the top of the page:

The Snapshot Preview header tells you which Snapshot you are currently previewing, when it was created, whether it is live or not, and who it was created by.

To exit the Snapshot Preview, click Exit Preview.

Snapshot Preview Scope? The scope of game Snapshot Preview mode is restricted to the Configurator pages in the portal, so the Manage section is not affected when you are in this mode.

Game Overview Editing? Note that in Snapshot Preview mode, you can still perform editing for game details, such as adding Groups for User Management.

Unpublishing a Snapshot

You might inadvertently publish a Snapshot to the game's Live stage, for example:

Before your game development is complete and you are not ready to launch your game.

On a game you are using specifically as a test game.

In such cases as these, you won't want to revert to another Snapshot. However, you can quickly unpublish the Snapshot:

1. In the Snapshots panel, click the unpublish icon on the published Snapshot:

A confirmation dialog appears:

Note that any data in the game's MongoDB are held for 30 days after which it is deleted.

2. Click Ok. The dialog closes and you will see the Snapshot as unpublished in the Snapshots panel and no longer highlighted in green: